By TIM WHEATLEY
The Indianapolis Star

	WORKSHOP

The three most important things for coming up with big ideas for big design are planning, planning and planning.

That was No. 1 of a top 10 list for creating a design desk that creates great ideas for your sports section. Jonathan Boho, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel's presentation editor for Sports, stressed to sports editors that planning is the most important thing for successful design and challenged them by saying that there is no excuse for not planning.

Other ideas that can help create great design that were discussed at the workshop included:

• Solicit headline ideas from around the newsroom. Sometimes those outside of Sports can come up with great headlines on big events. And solicit the headlines before the game on the really big events (NBA Finals, Super Bowl, etc.)

• Big ideas can be little. The Boston Globe incorporated the Fenway Park scoreboard into the masthead on their World Series sections.

• Try to understand designers. They need the right atmosphere for creativity to exist. Designers work hard so readers won't have to and designers are big picture just like sports editors.

• Include photo and graphics in your weekly planning meetings. If you can get a photo editor who physically is in sports, that's ideal.

• Look at other media. Television, internet, magazines and billboards are great sources of creative ideas.

• Try to avoid "design plagiarism." You can "steal without copying," Boho said.

If you don't have good designers in your department, go out and recruit. Sell them on the space, the nice blend of news and features that sports design offers.

The top 10 list for creating a design desk that creates great ideas:

1. Plan ahead, giving fair warning to designer.

2. Give designer lead, top of story or a budget line early.

3. Edit, edit and edit again leaving room for design.

4. Let designers do the work (keep your sketch pad to yourself!)

5. Insist that the designer shows, not tells you the idea.

6. Expand your storytelling palette with Q&As, keys to the game, matchups, breakdowns.

7. Learn what you like, keeping a file of things you like.

8. Defer judgment, keeping an open mind during brainstorming.

9. Encourage stupidity, remembering that there are no stupid ideas just workable and unworkable ideas.

10. Be consistent. It's not a handful of things you can do to make section better, but what you do every day to make the difference.

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